ONE of the world’s busiest boxing managers is so confident Rico Mueller will derail Brisbane’s Jeff Horn in their big welterweight title fight at the Sleeman Centre on Friday night that he has just signed the German sniper to a long-term contract.

Mueller, the No. 10 contender for the IBF welterweight title, will rise to No. 2 in the rankings and a probable world title shot if he can turn back the brutal body assault Horn has planned.

On Monday, New York-based promoter Greg Cohen, who also promotes Brisbane’s Dennis Hogan, announced he had added Mueller to a stable that includes middleweight contender Rob Brant and heavyweight contender Jarrell Miller.

On Wednesday, in Brisbane, Mueller’s pale blue eyes sparkled like a fighter pilot’s when the subject came up.

“Greg Cohen is very confident I will win and so am I,” he said through an interpreter.

“I am not worried if Jeff Horn is planning a big body assault against me. Good. I have seen him fight. He is a good boxer, very strong, but I am better.”

media_cameraGerman boxer Rico Mueller on Wednesday.

Mueller, 28, looked super-fit on Wednesday in a tight pink T-shirt and said he was just over the weight limit at 67kg. With an iron-grip handshake he said he was in Brisbane to bring down the local.

Mueller’s trainer Michel Trabant, 38, held the European welterweight title in 2002 and 2006 and went close to winning the world welterweight title in Berlin in 2003, dropping a close decision against Philadelphia’s Jose Antonio Rivera.

He says Mueller has a similar style to the hardworking American.

“Rico is very aggressive with a high level of activity,” Trabant said.

“We know this is a very important fight. I’ve never seen anyone work so hard or make sacrifices in the way that Rico has and he knows he can win a world title if he beats Jeff Horn.”

Mueller, the father of a three-year-old daughter, has just one loss in 22 fights and that was on points six years ago.

He said news that Horn on Tuesday was still 4kg over the weight limit of 66.7kg made him “very happy”.

“Horn will be very busy over the next 24 hours losing weight,” he said.

Horn, 28, the No. 3 contender for the world welterweight title, is unbeaten in 15 pro fights after making the quarter-finals of the 2012 Olympics in London.

Meanwhile, Melbourne’s former IBF world middleweight champion Sam Soliman has won a longstanding battle against Germany’s Boxing Commission (BDB).

The German District Court in Kiel yesterday declared a judgment by the German commission to ban Soliman from fighting for nine months and to void his victory against Felix Sturm in Dusseldorf in 2013 for using a sports drink containing a stimulant was unlawful.

The commission had wrongly claimed a violation of Anti-Doping Rules by Soliman.

“The decision by the German court has lifted a weight from my shoulders that I’ve had to live with for nearly four years,” Soliman said.

“I was never going to give up seeking to right the injustice. I’ve spent my whole career committed to clean and healthy living, and the German Boxing Commission’s ‘unlawful’ decision hit hard.”